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SMOKERS: THE COST TO SOCIETY?
Lately, anti-smoking activists in pushing their controlling agenda, have become stuck on the cost of smoking and smokers on society. The anti-smoking industry, like parrots, now proports an "estimated" figure of $100 billion dollars annually in health care costs and worker lost productivity. This is a figure that is statistical guessing and cannot be proven in actual costs. There is another "estimated" figure of $65 billion, which comes from the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). Let's take a closer look at some figures from the DHHS, 1990 statistics, and find out what is costing society money in health care. According to the DHHS (again, their statistics), tobacco use costs the health care system $65 billion; illicit drug use $66 billion; alcohol use $98 billion. According to those statistics, tobacco use is not the number one problem, not even number two! Looking at those figures, we'll take the tax paid on the products used according to cost to the system overall. Tobacco use may cost $65 billion in health care, but it does not cause other problems. You can live, work, drive and play without impairment to your faculties. In fact, it has been proven that nicotine enhances performance. The figures in sick days and lost productivity costs of smokers is not provable. It may just be that nicotine being a stimulant that pushes smokers to really produce more, not less. Taking the tax base, cigarette smokers pay $16 billion dollars to the federal government. Going on to the state level, in California for example, smokers pay a 32% tax on each pack they buy. If we added all the states into the picture, smokers would far surpass paying in taxes what they cost society. Now we'll take illicit drug use. Most people who use illegal drugs pay not a penny in taxes on those drugs. What they cost the system in health care is a total deficit, PERIOD. Not to mention the cost of the addict in social security benefits, unemployment, general assistance, etc. The burden here far outweighs anything a smoker may be perceived to cost society. It is also estimated that 25-50% of all the homeless have drug or alcohol problems. How much does that cost the system? To go one step farther, how much of the crime in our cities is caused by drug use and trafficking? How many homicides occur because of drug wars and profit making? If we "added" up all the costs of illegal drug use, the costs would make smoking look petty. The cost of illegal drugs to society should be the prime concern of our "health educators," not smoking. Now we go on to alcohol. That costs the health care system $98 billion a year. The one positive is that there are alcohol taxes...but those taxes don't even come near tobacco taxes. Yet the health care system must pay out more than tobacco, about 30% more (again, just basing it on health care according to the DHHS)! To go on, how much does it cost the health care system to treat abused and battered spouses, or children? How much does it cost the system not only in drunk driving deaths (which are around 30,000 per year) but the costs involved in all accidents caused by alcohol that each citizen must pay for? We must ask ourselves how much more in real lost work time and sick days does it cost the employer for the alcohol abuser (rather than the smoker)? Again, how much social security, unemployment insurance, etc., does the system have to pay for alcohol abuse? I think that the figures would make smoking look like a very minor wound, probably more like a scratch. The anti-smoking industry has done well to perpetrate a most effective hoax on the American public. The anti-smokers have fostered hate and lies to push their agenda. One also must realize that the anti-smoking industry must perpetuate itself to survive. The salaries of many thousands of people depend on this. How many controlists would be put out of work and burden the system? We all know that after the smoking issue, there is nothing worth attacking...except maybe alcohol. The sad thing is that they are probably taking away money best spent elsewhere for more important causes. Yes, we know, the smoking issue is the only problem America faces today. Tell that to the poor child whose stomach is empty, or the unemployed parent who can't make ends meet. I have a perfect solution for those unemployed ... we could steer them to the anti-smoking industry. There are plenty of jobsto control Americans when it comes to smoking. It would seem that their pockets are bottomless thanks to government funding, not only by us all, but specifically in some states, by smokers themselves. When Americans realize that the smoking issue, as pushed by the anti-smoking industry, is nothing more than a mere boil on a body that is diseased, then we will start to provide solutions to the real issues that should concern us as Americans. On that same point, our elected officials should get off the anti-smoking bandwagon and deal with the problems that most affect our lives in a much more serious and immediate manner. Could it be that since smokers are a minority and are easy to beat down that so much attention is paid to this issue? One would think so, since the drug problem (which has nearly doubled since 1993) is not attacked as aggressively as it should be.
San Francisco, CA 94159 1-415-824-4716 http://www.forces.org
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